Category Archives: Media

You know the media has been suckered into a story when the entertainment media and the ‘quality’ news outlets begin quoting one another. Fawning over one another, really.

If you haven’t noticed, watch how the ‘Bruce-Caitlyn’ story in Vanity Fair is being echoed by outlets sch as The New York Times (The Woman Behind Caitlyn Jenner’s Vanity Fair Cover),TMZ (reporting on the Diane Sawyer interview about “the biggest reveal of 2015 for sure…”), to Us Magazine, and the Perez Hilton’s of this world.

Consider too, the ‘reporting’ being done, and the attempt to give the story gravitas based on the tweets. You know something is seriously wrong with journalism, when the headline such as “Caitlyn Jenner Crushes Record for Fastest Time to Reach 1 Million Twitter Followers” becomes a basis for a story.

Think about it. Would a reporter have written a story of ‘courage’ had half a million people ‘followed’ someone with no publicist or celebrity photographer in tow? The mad rush to cover this event –and it seems like a media event, when you think about how carefully orchestrated it is, with photo-shoots, and Kardashian-ized comments going back and forth– even had Us Weekly retracting a story.

There are so much more important things the media could be occupied with, but all we get is a story validated by the number of tweets, followers, viewers and ‘unique authors.’

I didn’t know until I read your story, Buzz, that Caitlyn Jenner has a deal with the E! television network for a docuseries about her life. It’s the same team that does “Keeping Up With The Kardashians.” Why is she doing this? Is it the money? Is she at all worried about exploitation?

His answer?

“I think part of it is money. As she says in the piece, you know, I’m a businesswoman. I have a right to make a living…”

I don’t know if this is an age thing, but commercial radio and TV ads irritate me. They seem to be eager to drown us in triva –not to mention groan-worthy humor. (have you seen that latest McDonald’s ad about French Fries and chicken something? If not, avoid it like the plague!)

Why is it that a British baby that’s 4th or fifth in line for a ‘crown’ that nobody quite cares about fills our channels? Or why the obsession with the other royal family over on this side of the pond? I’m not talking about the Clintons, but the Kardashians. So many important local and global events are unfolding, but we get non-stop coverage of trivia.

NASA tested a 10-engine aircraft capable of vertical take-off, that could change idea of unmanned vehicles. Interesting, since Amazon seems to think the ‘delivery drones’ are actually becoming more possible.

Speaking of books, there’s the Arthur C. Clarke Science Fiction award in the UK, to a young writer, Emily St. John Mandel. It’s been described a novel about the ‘hyper-globalized’ future. Perhaps John Kerry, and Jeff Bezos are reading it right now, while ignoring the Clintons-in-waiting, and the princess of Cambridge, or whatever she is called.

I’m not talking of reporters coming under fire on dangerous missions. I’m talking about keeping up the communication when all hell breaks loose in front of you, and you’re on camera.

Take a look at how Phoenix-based Fox 10 News reporter Cory McCloskey handled an arguably hot situation. Cory is a weather reporter on the field. Apparently, in this instance in-studio, the weather map went berserk. The data on the map I mean. I won’t give it away – watch!

The above video clip (viewed more than 4 million times as of today) is the stuff that ought to be used in Journalism school. I’m sure my friends in Ahwatukee might not laugh so hard, because we folk in the Chandler area were not subject to his satire.

Mr. McCloskey: I wish there was a sub-category in the Pulitzers (under ‘Explanatory Reporting’ maybe?) that is awarded for humor, and not missing a beat.

You know it’s creative because no one seems to be talking about the contents of the envelopes that c was supposedly carrying to the nation’s lawmakers at the Capitol. We are all focused on the delivery method, aren’t we?

Marshall McLuhan who coined the phrase ‘the medium is the message’ must be smiling, up there. No tweets. No PR agency. No Facebook page. But a pretty powerful statement.

Note: Hughes does maintain a website, where he says

Hello – I’m Doug Hughes, a mailman, pilot and the author of this web site. In my time, I’ve delivered a lot of letters, and I’m delivering 535 letters by ‘air mail’ today – a special delivery to every member of the US Congress.

On this blog post (worth a read) he speaks of wanting to ‘change the narrative’ in Washington about whom we elect. He might succeed — if only the evening news folk will only stop talking about the potential danger of the stunt.

I have met some of these ‘students’ who have subsequently gone on to do amazing work in the digital space in Sri Lanka.

But now that I teach a different age and demographic of students, it is interesting to see how some major concerns of digital citizenship, have been over-ridden by new ones. Then there was no WhatsApp, and Instagram or Snapchat to think about. At that time, it was almost inconceivable that these new digital channels would practically revise the political spectrum in Sri Lanka – as Nalaka Gunewardene has well documented.

Thank you for the experience all of you who attended.

What are the most important tools you use in your work today? More importantly what are your biggest challenges? Privacy? Information overload? Earning trust? PR?

I love the fact that the audio format has been on the upswing, even despite the explosion of screen-based communication options. Depending on who you ask, they will tell you video didn’t assassinate the radio star for various reasons. Such as

Podcasts is immensely portable, and does is perfect for multi-tasking

Podcasts capture the ‘authentic’ voice of the person or the moment being represented – no fake ‘DJ voice’ required

Podcasts have in their DNA something akin to long-form journalism – deep dives into content, rather than skimming a topic

Podcasts lend themselves to drama, even while being authentic. The nearest thing to the documentary.

The idea for the page title, ‘Next Stop, Mars’ was from Lori. Which is timely, considering so much being discussed –NASA, and aerospace companies — about humankind’s next planetary home. Astronaut, Scott Kelly, who is the twin brother of astronaut Mark Kelly, is on a mission that begins in March 2015.

Kody Ensley, working on Robonaut-2 at Johnson Space Center. Kody spoke to our students in Oct. 2012.